He gave a snort of disbelief.
“If you won’t give us the files,” Rachel said, “make copies.”
“That would take all day!”
“You and I will work on it together,” she said. “Irene and Travis have other things to do.”
“So do I.”
“No, you don’t,” she said flatly.
He looked among the three of us. He didn’t find anyone in sympathy with him.
“Go on, Irene,” she said. “I’ll drop them off at your house later.”
Travis stood up. Richmond looked at his bandaged hand and said, “I didn’t plant that bomb. I’d never do something like that, especially not right outside a cop’s house.”
“So you’ve checked out our backgrounds,” I said.
“Yours,” he acknowledged.
“Then I should tell you that not only is Rachel a licensed PI, she’s-”
“An ex-cop,” he finished. “I could guess that much.”
“A former homicide detective,” I said.
He looked surprised.
“Phoenix,” she said. “Retired.”
“You’re too young!”
She smiled. “Save your flattery for your society columnist.”
He looked at me and said, “You’ll tell her, won’t you? Margot, I mean?”
“Tell her what?”
“That she doesn’t have any reason to be afraid of me.”
“I don’t know that for a fact, do I?” I said, and left with Travis.
21
“You need to take a pain pill?” I asked Travis, who was looking down at his hand as it rested in his lap.
“No. Maybe later.” He glanced over his shoulder as we pulled out of the parking lot. “Maybe we shouldn’t leave Rachel alone with that guy.”
“She can take care of herself. Or are you worried about his safety?”
He smiled a little, then lapsed back into silence.
“What’s on your mind, Travis?”
“My uncle lives here in Los Alamitos. He raised my dad, but I’ve never met him. I guess I was just thinking about what Father Chris said.”
“You’ve never met Gerald?”
“No. I’m not even sure where he lives. I just know it’s somewhere in Los Alamitos.”
Knowing I was going to hate myself for not going straight home and crawling into bed, I said, “Reach into my purse, and hand me the little notebook you find in there.”
He did as I asked, and at the next stoplight, I flipped to the page where I had written the addresses Rachel gave me for the DeMonts and Gerald Spanning. We hadn’t reached Spanning’s street yet.
“I can take you there right now if you want to go,” I said.
“But-you need to rest-”
“A short visit to your uncle won’t do me in. Just call Rachel at Richmond’s office and let her know what’s up.”
He hesitated, then made the call.
When he finished, he said, “Maybe this isn’t a good idea.”
“Nervous?”
“Yes,” he admitted, then added, “I’ll be all right.”
But a few minutes later he said, “Maybe we should call first.”
“The only time I called him, I got the number off the computer, so I don’t have it with me.”
“You’ve talked to him?”
“Only very briefly, when I was looking for you.”
“Oh.”
“He said to ask you to give him a call someday.”
“He did?”
There was so much hope in those two words, I wondered if I had set him up for disappointment.
He saw my hesitation and said, “Maybe he was just being polite.”
“I don’t know,” I said, trying for a little more honesty, although polite was hardly the word I would use for my brief conversation with Gerald Spanning. “I hope he’s home. I want to talk to him before I talk to the DeMonts.”
“Why?”
“Several reasons. Your uncle was around the DeMont family for many years. He must know something about what your father’s life with Gwendolyn was like, and that may be of help to us.”
He seemed lost in his own thoughts.
As I slowed to search for Spanning’s street, Travis said, “You haven’t asked me many questions about the money.”
“What money?”
“My father’s money.”
I made a right onto a street lined with a mixture of small wood-frame homes and two-story apartment buildings. “What about it?”
“Aren’t you curious about what’s going to become of his millions?”
“Millions?” I pulled over to the curb. We were nowhere near the address I was looking for, but this called for some discussion. I turned off the engine and said, “I guess that shouldn’t surprise me, but it does.”
“Of course, millionaires are fairly common these days-”
“Oh, sure. Thick on the ground.”
“You’re sitting next to one,” he said.
We eyed one another for a moment. I blinked first. “Don’t you need to talk to your father’s lawyer before you start calling yourself a millionaire? See a will or something?”
“No. Like I said, he gave most of it to me before he died, through trusts. That was one reason my mother and I had a falling out. She told me it was blood money.”
He fell silent, brooding for a moment.
“She must have changed her mind about that,” I said. “I can’t believe she married him if she thought he was a killer.”
“Maybe. It wasn’t for his money. Mr. Brennan said I had almost everything. When my father became…” He faltered, then said, “unable to care for himself because of the illness, he sold his properties, even his home. He kept enough to pay off his obligations. He-he died sooner than expected, so perhaps there was some small amount of money left in his estate.”
“So you’re this millionaire, riding around in a pickup truck, sleeping in the camper?”
He stared straight ahead, not answering.
“Jesus.” I leaned my head back against the headrest. “And here I thought you were smart.”
He looked back at me. “What I choose to do-”
“Travis,” I interrupted, “why are you wasting your time with Rachel and me?”
“What?”
“You could hire dozens of people to help you out. And a couple dozen bodyguards while you’re at it.”
For some odd reason, this seemed to amuse him. “If I did,” he asked, “would you stop looking for the person who killed my mother?”
“No, but that has nothing to do-”
“Why not?”
“Why not?” I repeated blankly.
He nodded.
I opened my mouth, shut it again.
“Tell me what you were going to say,” he insisted.
“You wouldn’t like it,” I said, then muttered, “Probably wouldn’t believe it.”
He waited.
In the silence that followed, I suddenly found myself thinking of my mother-not one of the carefully sorted out memories I had of her, but an unbidden, sharp and perfect memory from an imperfect time: My mother is thin and fragile; her skin the color of ashes; her beautiful auburn hair thinned and dulled by chemotherapy; there are dark circles beneath her green eyes. As she lies propped up against the pillows in my parents’ bed, she reminds me of a young bird fallen from its nest. Briana is with her, sitting next to her, on the edge of the bed.
Hoping to redeem myself with the angry God who has made her so ill, during these days I’m trying to be helpful, to not argue with Barbara, to be the good and quiet daughter I have never been. I’ve made tea, brought it in to them. I’m watching my mother. I’ve felt frightened for her for weeks, but for the last few days especially. She seems so tired, and at eleven, almost twelve, I’m old enough to see that she has considered a previously unthinkable notion-she has thought of giving up, of letting go. And now, entering the room with a small tray, I see that Briana has told her something that has made her cry. I’m upset until I realize they are happy tears.
“You must help us think of a name for your new cousin,” Briana says, and seeing my confusion, my mother tells me my aunt is expecting a child.
I’m amazed at this news, and look at Briana’s stomach, which doesn’t look pregnant; I begin to refocus my attention on the adults’ conversation only when I hear my mother say, “Yes, of course, I would be proud to be the baby’s godmother.” And the two of them are looking at one another, my mother’s hand clasped in Briana’s, as if they have pledged something to one another.